Stephen G Morris’s research while affiliated with Georgia State University and other places

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Publications (6)

Figure 1 Jeremy Case 1: Bank Robbing Scenario.  
Figure 2 Judgments of Free Will and Moral Responsibility. Percentage of participants who judged Jeremy acted of his own free will when he robbed a bank (negative), saved a child (positive), and went jogging (neutral), as compared with percentage of participants who judged Jeremy morally responsible when he robbed a bank (negative) and saved a child (positive).  
Figure 3 Comparison of Free Will and ACO Judgments. Comparison of percentage of participants who judged that Jeremy acted of his own free will (FW) to those who judged that he could have chosen otherwise (ACO) in robbing a bank (negative), saving a child (positive), and going jogging (neutral).  
Figure 4 Judgments of Free Will, Moral Responsibility and ACO. Percentage of subjects who judged that Fred and Barney acted of their own free will (FW), were morally responsible for their actions (MR), and could have chosen otherwise (ACO).  
Surveying Freedom: Folk Intuitions About Free Will and Moral Responsibility
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November 2008

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3,303 Reads

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356 Citations

Philosophical Psychology

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Stephen Morris

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Jason Turner

Philosophers working in the nascent field of 'experimental philosophy' have begun using methods borrowed from psychology to collect data about folk intuitions concerning debates ranging from action theory to ethics to epistemology. In this paper we present the results of our attempts to apply this approach to the free will debate, in which philosophers on opposing sides claim that their view best accounts for and accords with folk intuitions. After discussing the motivation for such research, we describe our methodology of surveying people's prephilosophical judgments about the freedom and responsibility of agents in deterministic scenarios. In two studies, we found that a majority of participants judged that such agents act of their own free will and are morally responsible for their actions. We then discuss the philosophical implications of our results as well as various difficulties inherent in such research.

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Is Incompatibilism Intuitive?

July 2008

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10 Citations

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Stephen G Morris

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Jason Turner

Experimental philosophy is a new movement that seeks to return the discipline of philosophy to a focus on questions about how people actually think and feel. Departing from a long-standing tradition, experimental philosophers go out and conduct systematic experiments to reach a better understanding of people’s ordinary intuitions about philosophically significant questions. Although the movement is only a few years old, it has already sparked an explosion of new research, challenging a number of cherished assumptions in both philosophy and cognitive science. The present volume provides an introduction to the major themes of work in experimental philosophy, bringing together some of the most influential articles in the field along with a collection of new papers that explore the theoretical significance of this new research.

Neuroscience and the Free Will Conundrum

June 2007

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25 Reads

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7 Citations

Stephen G Morris
Summary of Results
Is Incompatiblism Intuitive

July 2006

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540 Reads

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194 Citations

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

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STEPHEN G. MORRIS

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Jason TURNER

Incompatibilists believe free will is impossible if determinism is true, and they often claim that this view is supported by ordinary intuitions. We challenge the claim that incompatibilism is intuitive to most laypersons and discuss the significance of this challenge to the free will debate. After explaining why incompatibilists should want their view to accord with pretheoretical intuitions, we suggest that determining whether incompatibilism is in fact intuitive calls for empirical testing. We then present the results of our studies, which put significant pressure on the claim that incompatibilism is intuitive. Finally, we consider and respond to several potential objections to our approach.

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Identifying the Explanatory Weakness of Strong Altruism: The Needle in the 'Haystack Model'

December 2005

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53 Reads

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1 Citation

Philosophy of Science

Stephen G. Morris

Evolutionary theorists have encountered difficulty in explaining how altruistic behavior can evolve. I argue that these theorists have made this task more difficult than it needs to be by focusing their efforts on explaining how nature could select for a strong type of altruism that has powerful selection forces working against it. I argue that switching the focus to a weaker type of altruism renders the project of explaining how altruism can evolve significantly less difficult. I offer a model. of weak altruism that can avoid many of the difficulties that evolutionary accounts of altruism have traditionally faced.

Citations (5)

... In research with college students, Ogletree and Oberle (2008) reported positive correlations between agreeing with a free will perspective and agreeing with the moral responsibility for people who commit crimes or hurt others. Similarly, in the research by Nahmias and colleagues (Nahmias et al., 2005;Nahmias, Morris, Nadelhoffer, &Turner, 2006), the majority of participants both believed in free will and considered a person blameworthy for either robbing a bank or stealing a necklace. ...

Reference:

Perceptions of choice: Free will, moral responsibility, and mind-body dualism in humans, chimpanzees, and rats.
Is Incompatibilism Intuitive?
  • Citing Chapter

  • July 2008

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Stephen G Morris

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Jason Turner

... Since this is not contested by free will skeptics, findings cannot be attributed to them. Second, people generally assume that they have free will or, at the very least, take a compatibilist position in favor of free will (Baumeister & Brewer, 2012;Nahmias et al., 2005). Therefore, participants in correlational or manipulation studies need not represent the views of free will skeptics. ...

Reference:

The Life of a Free Will Skeptic Is Still Meaningful and Satisfactory
Surveying Freedom: Folk Intuitions About Free Will and Moral Responsibility

Philosophical Psychology

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Stephen Morris

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Jason Turner

... However, this method soon ran into some difficulties. While the results of first studies suggested that most people were "natural compatibilists" (Nahmias et al., 2005(Nahmias et al., , 2006, later studies suggested that participants' answers depended on the content on the vignettes: abstract vignettes elicited more incompatibilist answers compared to concrete ones (Nichols & Knobe, 2007), while vignettes focusing on psychological determinism elicited more compatibilist intuitions than vignettes focusing on neuroscientific determinism (Nahmias et al., 2007). Searching to explain these conflicting results, Murray and Nahmias (2014) soon found out that a non-negligible proportion of participants presented with such vignettes tended to interpret certain deterministic vignettes as implying bypassing (i.e. the claim that agents' mental states play no role in the production of their decisions and actions). ...

Reference:

Failure to Comprehend Determinism or Failure to Measure Comprehension? Methodological Issues in Experimental Philosophy of Free Will
Is Incompatiblism Intuitive

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research

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STEPHEN G. MORRIS

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Jason TURNER

... The Act addressed some of the concerns raised by scientists and clinicians about C-47, and contained a more optimistic tone about the nature of reproductive technologies. Although arguments centered on the moral status of the embryo as a living human organism were still present in the new legislation, the Act permitted greater flexibility in embryo research (Caulfield and Bubela 2007;Morris 2007;Scala 2007, 226). With respect to embryos, it prohibits the following: the combination of human and non-human reproductive material; reproductive human embryonic cloning; therapeutic embryonic cloning; paying for embryos; and maintaining an in vitro embryo for more than 14 days. ...

Reference:

Everything and nothing: regulating embryo research in Canada
Canada's Assisted Human Reproduction Act: A Chimera of Religion and Politics
  • Citing Article

  • March 2007

Stephen G Morris

... Of course, brain function has been manipulated for years through more conventional means, as people's minds are quite well equipped to exert personal and social influence through the sending and decoding of information (Walsh, Desmond, & Pascual-Leone, 2006). Nevertheless, the use of a technology that is capable of directly modulating brain function and behavior raises important ethical and even philosophical questions about the status and position of autonomy in our understanding of human behavior (Gazzaniga & Steven, 2004; Morris, 2007). A thorough treatment of neuroscience and free will is far beyond the scope of this discussion; suffice to say that the use of brain stimulation technologies even on freely consenting volunteers must be tempered by the potential for infringing on individual autonomy. ...

Reference:

Non-Invasive Brain Stimulation in the Detection of Deception: Scientific Challenges and Ethical Consequences
Neuroscience and the Free Will Conundrum
  • Citing Article

  • June 2007

Stephen G Morris